Actually...

: : : : WOULDN'T TOUCH
IT WITH A TEN-FOOT POLE - "This expression may have been suggested by the 10-foot
poles that river boatmen used to pole their boats along in shallow water.In the
sense of not wanting to get involved or having strong distaste for something,
the words aren't recorded until the late 19th century." From "Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins" by Robert Hendrickson (Facts on File, New York, 1997).
Another reference has an earlier appearance of the phrase:, "I WOULDN'T TOUCH
IT WITH A TEN-FOOT POLE" -- It's a dangerous or disagreeable, and I intend to
avoid it. The 'ten-foot pole' is not an item ready to hand, and neither is the
'barge pole' which figure in similar expression. Still, they both serve as figures
of speech, and so did 'tongs.' With 'tongs' (spelled 'tongues') the expression
was known by 1639, when John Clarke included it in his 'Paroemiologia Anglo-Latino':
'Not to be handled with a paire of tongues.' Then 'ten-foot pole' was in used
in the expression by 1758, the 'barge pole' by 1877." From "Dictionary of Cliches"
by James Rogers (Ballantine Books, New York, 1985).

: : And all these years
I thought the phrase was a racial slur!

: So retro! There's not one bit of evidence
that people of Polish descent are more likely than anyone else to have extra appendages.

There
was a Polish guy at boarding school, the communal showers had gone by this point
so I can't comment on your assertion, but the guy was actually about 7 feet tall.
So there.